Twitter has been a great resource for inspiration for my blog posts in the past, and the start of this week provided me with another good subject. This time, it was a tweet from @RhinoAluminium: Anyone else fed up with consumers asking to dodge the VAT? You know the ones... This brought a few of [...]
I was contacted by an Anthony Wareing a few weeks ago. He pointed me to a story within the food industry which coordinated a day of action against 20% on their food. Lots of companies and eateries joined in to lower, just for one day, the VAT on their food to 12.5%. He pointed this [...]
>So then, who's booking into January 2011?We're now planning the first few weeks of next January, which is fantastic news for us. This time last year I wasn't able to be so positive. But this year has seen a marked improvement and we're now able to make a good positive start into 2011.Lead levels have [...]
>This week has been manic! It's been the usual case of people rushing to get windows and doors ordered and wanting them in before Christmas and before the new VAT rate in January. It never ceases to surprise me even though the same thing happens every year. People seem to wait and wait, put it [...]
>Before the General Election, there was an idea being thrown around that houses which didn't install home improvements to improve their homes energy efficiency would be penalised in higher council tax rises.This seems to have been put on the back burner, which is a shame because it would have provided a big boost for the [...]
>If you've got a few grand knocking about but don't know whether or not to spend it, then the Bank Of England won't have made it any easier.At the beginning of the week the Bank Of England were saying that to help prop up the economy we all need to be going out and spending [...]
>Come 4th January, VAT will be at 20%. But will this make a difference?When VAT fell to 15% just before the start of 2009, the Government thought that it would give the buying public the nudge to start spending a little more. In reality we found that it made hardly any difference. All it did [...]
>Right, now we've all been told what we're not getting in the future, we can start to make some assessments. Here's my rough, quick analysis, then I'll explain it a bit further. If your in the public sector you've not got much to cheer about, if your a pensioner that was pretty good listening, if [...]
>It took all of about 45 minutes for Britain's colours to change from red to blue. A poignant statement from the outgoing Gordon Brown began the formal pomp and procedures of the Queen asking David Cameron to form the next Government.So, say hello to increased VAT rates. Say hello to increased petrol prices. Say hello [...]
>We are going to have the last budget before the upcoming election on Wednesday, and I'm sure many in the window industry will be looking to the Government for some much welcome support. Like the car industry and boiler industry, there has been a concerted effort on the Government's petitions website for Number 10 to [...]
>We had two sets of customers place their orders with us today. Normally this wouldn't be such a big deal but what surprised us is that both of them said that they weren't at all bothered about paying the higher VAT rate which comes into force from 1st January. Bear in mind also that these [...]
>As everyone will be aware, on the 1st of January VAT will go back up to 17.5%. To me this won't make a slight bit of difference, just as it didn't make the slightest bit of difference when it was reduced. Double glazing firms don't have to panic about the loss of business because an [...]
>Yet again our industry has been ignored. £435 million pounds has been earmarked to improve the insulation of Britain's homes, loft insulation, cavity wall insulation and new energy efficient boilers were mentioned, but nothing about energy efficient windows! I've said it before, it's in the government's interest to help the energy efficient window market, it [...]
>Figures released today show that RPI measure of inflation for the UK has fallen to zilch percent. On top of that interest rates are practically at zero too. So with the price of living coming down, and all the government initiatives to try to get people spending again, I've failed to witness any marked increase [...]
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